Friday, August 03, 2007

Adnan Mulla, a bright youth, was kept in illegal detention for 35 days and subjected to torture, forcing him to 'confess' that he was amongst those responsible for the Ghatkopar bomb blast in 2003.

After over a month when the police officials apparently got tired of their third degree measures and he didn't fall in the cops' trap, Mulla was framed under POTA and sent to jail without any charge sheet against him.

He was about to get married within a few days and his fiancee, with henna on her hands, had to run to the police station and courts along with rest of the family members. Nearly 4-1/2 years have elapsed and she is still waiting for him to be released. The High Court says that if there is no evidence, a POTA accused can get bail in three years but this is the fifth year and he is yet to get out of the prison.

His family used RTI to find out the truth about the illegal detention for 35 days. On the basis of this proof, the family approached POTA court for bail, but even after six months of filing of the application the hearing is yet to take place.

Muhammad Adeeb writes in Rashtriya Sahara (Urdu) about the plight of young Muslims in Maharashtra who were falsely implicated under draconian laws like TADA and POTA. And this is not a lone story. There are hundreds of similar tales of harassment of Muslim youths whose lives have been shattered in the last decade-and-half.

'We believe that an offender should get maximum sentence and must pay for his crimes but innocent Muslims youths who were framed all over Maharashtra in false cases for several years should get justice', he further writes.

Mulla's only fault was that he happened to be the relative of Saquib Nachan. The Maharashtra police faces innumerable similar charges of framing innocent youths and putting them behind bars, to show their efficiency by making such arrests.

Ironically the Congress-NCP government that had come to power in the state on the plank of justice to minorities, implementation of Sri Krishna Commission report and umpteen such promises, has failed to put a check on such atrocities.

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